Inside Unmanned Systems

AUG-SEP 2018

Inside Unmanned Systems provides actionable business intelligence to decision-makers and influencers operating within the global UAS community. Features include analysis of key technologies, policy/regulatory developments and new product design.

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56 August/September 2018 unmanned systems
inside
AIR HAZARD LOCATION
Cleanup
T
o clean up nuclear waste at sites such
as Fukushima, decontamination teams
must f irst f ind out exactly where ra-
dioactive materials have accumulated.
Now, researchers are developing ro-
bots that can f ly, swim and even crawl
through pipes to map out precisely where radioac-
tive waste is hiding.
"Ideally, robots go where you don't want to put
a person, such as a radiation hazard," said Kostas
Alexis, an assistant professor of computer science
and engineering and head of the Autonomous
Robots Lab at the University of Nevada, Reno. "Also,
robots can go where people don't have easy entry,
such as a sealed site—if you wanted to put a human
in there, you'd have to open it, which can be quite
costly, and then follow special procedures that may
put humans at risk. A robot would be comparatively
low in cost and greatly reduce risks."
Robots also can be much more systematic and
consistent in their inspections than people, Alexis
said. "You can track changes in radiation levels at
the centimeter level, and know what the changes are
at every point on a map, which can help you infer the
potential radiation hazard much better."
What has limited the use of ground robots at
nuclear waste sites is that sometimes they must tra-
verse narrow spaces and terrain that is not f lat—and
there might be buildings on the sites with multiple
stories, Alexis said. "Land rovers generally cannot
deal with going from one f loor to another."
FLYING UNDERGROUND
Unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) can be used to
map radiation in such hard-to-reach areas, Alexis
said. "(The) ones f lying above Fukushima were an
excellent example of such technology. The differ-
ence with our system is that we're f lying mostly
underground."
Alexis and his colleagues experimented with a
small UAS and successfully completed a proof of
concept for a UAS that could autonomously f ly it-
Photos courtesy of Kostas Alexis.
Robots that fl y, swim and
crawl through pipes are
helping with the clean
up of radioactive zones
by mapping hard-to-fi nd
nuclear waste.
by Charles Q. Choi
This prototype drone,
built by the University of
Nevada, can map nuclear
waste storage tunnels.
Charting